Economists at Bank of America anticipate the Fed will emphasize that it has the flexibility to either raise or lower its purchase pace, as Chairman Ben Bernanke went out of his way to note at a press conference in March.

2. -- The economic calendar in the U.S. Wednesday includes a rates decision from the Federal Reserve, the ADP Employment Change index for April at 8:15 a.m. EDT, the ISM Index for April at 10 a.m., and construction spending for March at 10 a.m.

3. -- U.S. stocks on Tuesday rose after a Conference Board report showed a strengthening in consumer confidence offset indications of business weakness in the Midwest.

5. -- Apple ( AAPL) sold $17 billion worth of corporate debt in the largest corporate non-financial bond offering in history, according to data from Bloomberg.

In the six-part offering, Apple sold debt with maturities starting in 2016 and ending in 2043, according to a regulatory filing. As part of the offering, the iPhone maker will be selling $5.5 billion worth of 10-year fixed debt, which will start trading at 75 basis points above comparable U.S. Treasury debt. Currently, the yield on a 10-year U.S. Treasury is 1.675%.

Apple will also sell $1 billion worth of three-year fixed rate notes, which will start trading at 5 basis points over the 3-month LIBOR rate.

Apple announced the debt offering as part of its massive capital return to shareholders when it reported earnings earlier this month.

6. -- Yahoo! ( YHOO) scrapped a deal to buy a 75% stake in online video Web site Dailymotion because of objections by the French government, reports said.

An acquisition of Dailymotion -- the deal was valued at $300 million -- would have been the biggest deal in the 10-month tenure of Yahoo! CEO Marissa Mayer, Reuters said.

7. -- A private-equity group made up of Bain Capital and Golden Gate Capital has emerged as the lead contender to buy BMC Software ( BMC) for more than $6.5 billion, three people familiar with the matter told Reuters.

8. -- Merck ( MRK) posted first-quarter net income of $1.59 billion, or 52 cents a share, down from $1.74 billion, or 56 cents a share, a year earlier.

Adjusted earnings in the quarter were 85 cents a share.

Revenue fell 9% to $10.67 billion from $11.73 billion a year earlier.

Analysts were expecting earnings of 80 cents a share on revenue of $11.09 billion.

9. -- MasterCard ( MA) is expected by analysts on Wednesday to post first-quarter earnings of $6.18 a share on revenue of $1.93 billion.

10. -- Comcast ( CMCSA), the nation's largest cable company, said first-quarter net income rose 17%, powered by continued strong results from its cable operations.

Comcast posted earnings of $1.44 billion, or 54 cents a share, in the first quarter, up from $1.22 billion, or 45 cents a share, in the year-earlier period.